#sloan.

The man in the reflection of Agustin’s General and Feed Store is not Vash the Stampede. With his reflection superimposed over the peeling poster taped to the inside of the display window, a passerby might claim that he bears a passing resemblance to the legendary outlaw responsible for the JuLai incident. 

To everyone else here in this small town, he is just Eriks. 

9:30AM.

The day has only just begun, and the list of chores he has is still long. Eriks adjusts the brown paper bag in his arms once more and cards through the contents one last time to ensure that nothing is missing. Grandma Sheryl has lectured him on the importance of precision before. Every week, they need to replenish their stock of: onions, potatoes, garlic, and ginger. No, dry won’t do. No, you can’t sub taro root for potatoes even though they are both tubers. And don’t forget to pick up a dozen tomas eggs!

He can feel his ears ringing already, and he hasn’t even stepped away from the storefront yet. Rolling a few potatoes out of the way and pulling back a few layers of wax paper is met with a small exhale of satisfaction through his nose.

Next, to pick up the latest double dollar novel penned by the Mc Caffrey sisters for Lina. He makes it about two steps, hand still half in the bag when he suddenly comes up into a solid wall of…fleshy mass?

“Oh, uh. Sorry about that. Didn’t see you there! Excuse me!” Eriks exclaims, giving the unmoving mountain a pat on the shoulder as he strafes around the man to continue further into town. Before he can get out of arm’s reach, Eriks suddenly feels himself yanked backward by his shirt collar and is unceremoniously pressed up against Agustin’s window panes. 

“You. This you? You’re Vash the Stampede?” A pudgy finger presses into the glass next to his head. The man, dressed in raider leathers and spikes, lets out a garbled snort from the back of his throat when Eriks does not answer right away. The glint in his eyes is hungry and set. A predator who would take any excuse to latch onto their prey drive. “Look like him.”

“You know ‘im? I alwaysh wanted t’know what he was like.” His voice is distorted from being squished against the glass. He manages to push back against the man’s hand at his back and glances at the holster at the bandit’s hip, then continues, “Hey! Let’s talk about him over there. It’s too noisy over here. I’m Eriks. You are..?”

“I’m Ten-Shots. ‘Cuz that’s all I need…Vash the Stampede.”

Uh-oh. 

“Hey, let’s not get hasty, I just–” 

A crack rings out and a line of dust shoots up next to his foot where Ten-Shots fired a bullet directly into the ground. The quick-draw doesn't make him flinch.

Okay, then. So talkie time was over. Eriks looks down at the disturbed ground, then back up to meet Ten-Shots’ squinting, focused eyes looking at him down the barrel of his gun. 

“So…what happens after you shoot ten times? Does that mean you let me go?”

And then he runs, taking off in the opposite direction away from the center of town while hugging his precious cargo close to his chest. An onion bounces out, rolling off to the side and stopping against the wooden step of the local barber’s, but he can’t turn back for it now as bullets spit up dirt at either side of him. Grandma Sheryl will just have to forgo the French onion soup this week.

How many shots were they at? Four?

Bang!

It lost. Completely, utterly, lost. The moment it put on that headset, it allowed me to feast on its mind and gain power, gain control, just like it wanted. Identity ground to dust. Memories eaten up. Thoughts churned away. Existence melted down in the furnace of my being. Such silly human structures of thought fit not my toys.